


Fire Blanket

by 2Hummingbirds



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:01:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24842716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/2Hummingbirds/pseuds/2Hummingbirds
Summary: A study on female rage.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic & Leonie Pinelli, Annette Fantine Dominic/Leonie Pinelli
Comments: 9
Kudos: 44





	Fire Blanket

**Author's Note:**

> Leonie gets angry in this fic. If you do not like her, or if you do but feel that people focus too much on her lashing out and ignore all her positive traits, please know that I did not write this because I dislike her and want to make her look bad. Leonie being admittedly bad at reading people and quick to anger across the board are interesting traits and she's my favorite character.  
> Annette is in this fic because I was thinking about how as soon as I hit my adult height, I decided I'd choose to be 3 inches shorter.

Leonie knew she'd made a mistake when Annette pattered down the bricks towards her.

"Go away," Leonie said.

"I can see you're upset, so I thought you might need someone to... someone," said Annette.

"I don't," said Leonie.

Annette knit her brows in concern. "If that's true, why did you run to this corner between the building and the outer wall instead of going back to your room...?"

Leonie made a grating, frustrated noise. "I made a mistake," she lied.

It was easier than explaining to Annette that her room was too hot and the air in it was too thick and soft, and that she had a primal need to mash her palms and her face into the rough stone of the wall so she could feel something other than her own emotions, and how... Annette was correct, Leonie did want someone to find her. She did want someone to see when she cried. That was the most unjustifiable bit.

"Leonie, I'm sorry," said Annette. "Are you alright by yourself? Do you need me to make him apologize?"

_"No." Yes._

"He can be a complete menace, but he'll come around-"

"That's not it," said Leonie, screwing her eyes shut and pressing one cheek to the side of the parapet. "I'm the one who's wrong. I know it. I know I'm wrong but I still need to be mad right now and I can't be around people and I know it's my fault. I know that I'm... bad, at people! Why am I so upset?"

Leonie could tell she wasn't making sense, but the words kept tumbling out of her mouth anyway. She just picked up momentum, like a body running down a steep hill.

How could her brain both understand she was wrong to be upset and yet still charge ahead, turning her into an unsightly crying mess? The part of her that was supposed to recognize and stop this immature behavior and the part that felt it so deeply that stopping seemed out of the question were the same.

Annette, still standing a respectful distance away, pressed on. "No, I understand how you feel! I've gotten mad at him before too. He's apologized to me in the past."

But of course sweet little Annette could get an apology out of anyone who looked at her! Leonie's balled-up, directionless anger rushed out as though Annette opened a sluice.

"You're the last person I want to hear from right now!" she snapped. "You don't understand! You wouldn't understand..."

"You're crying! I'm trying to help you!"

There was a wavering to her voice... Leonie couldn't believe her ears. "Whyh are _you_ crying! Ugh... I can't stand you!"

"What did I do?" wailed Annette, frantically. "Whatever I did, I'll stop it, I'll listen, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

Unbidden, Leonie's mind unearthed a half-dozen things to dislike about Annette on the spot. _Nosy. Disgusting little people-pleaser. Everything comes easier to her. Got into Garreg Mach on a scholarship from magic school, which she probably didn't even need, while Leonie had to save for years and nearly bankrupt her entire village to pay the full tuition price. Smart, and cute, and lovable. Keeps looking, as Leonie makes herself a terrible mess, not coming closer but not abandoning her._ Leonie swallowed the ugliest insults down and focused on the only thing she could put words to right now.

"Stop apologizing! You didn't do anything!" Leonie's head began to hurt as she bit out her speech into the misty mountain scenery beyond the ledge. "You know what's unfair? You get to get mad and cry and then people apologize to you and tell you it's fine again the next day. You get to be small and nice and cute and get as upset as you want, but when I get upset, and it happens too often, and I can't control it, then _people remember that about me!_ Sometimes I just _wish... I was little!_ "

"But then you wouldn't be able to reach as far with a lance!" Annette blurted out.

And it was the stupidest thing - but Leonie finally whipped her head around to look straight at Annette.

What a completely incongruous thing to say. Annette should've said something about how being a tomboy made Leonie's life easier because she didn't need to be protected, or that it meant she didn't have to fend off unwanted advances, or that external perception wasn't reflective of innate skill, or that it didn't seem like Leonie particularly valued being tiny and girly herself. All indisputable facts with which Leonie agreed. But instead, Annette had said the same first dumb thing that came to Leonie's mind as well.

Annette's face was all wet and blotchy, an irreconcilable shade of pink against the orange of her hair. And Leonie realized she probably looked the same.

"Haha, what?" Leonie began to wipe her face on her arm guard.

"Sorry. That was stupid."

"It's my kind of stupid," said Leonie. She inhaled deeply of the pine-scented mountain air, then turned around and slid her back down the wall to sit. 

Annette walked over and pulled two handkerchiefs out of her satchel, because of course she carried around two. (What did it feel like to buy handkerchiefs new? To not have them dissolve and need to be replaced?) Wordlessly, Leonie took one. Annette slid down the wall next to her, and together they were silent for a good long while.

Leonie spoke up first: "I shouldn't have turned on you. You were trying to be nice to me."

"Thank you," said Annette. She paused. "Do you feel any better now?"

"To tell the truth, I don't."

"Oh."

"Sorry. I know you tried really hard to fix it, and I should've gotten it out already by now," Leonie began to choke up again, "but there's more and more of it, and it doesn't have anywhere to go."

Slumped over, Annette looked at the snotty kerchief in her lap. "Yeah, I guess it can't always be easy."

"I don't wish I were shorter," said Leonie resolutely. "I wish I felt less."

A corner of Annette's mouth twisted up. "You know... I might be better at hiding it, but I still wish I didn't feel things. Like at all. Or, no. Only when I wanted to. And then the rest of the time I wouldn't need to waste all my energy pretending to be cheerful."

It was Leonie's turn to say, "oh."

"I think the world expects the same thing of both of us," Annette continued. "To be cute and small and never get angry."

"I just don't bother rising to those expectations, huh."

"Yeah, but it isn't a bad thing to stand up for yourself."

"Annette, I didn't need to stand up for myself to you! You weren't hurting me! Saints, Annette, you gotta... stop putting yourself down."

"Ah," said Annette.

"Yeah."

The sun had been out of their direct sight for a while, tucked behind the bulk of a building, but as the sky screamed orange and pink, it was safe to assume the sun had now dipped behind the reservoir. The bells rang; dinner was almost over. Annette got up first, brushing dirt and moss off of her legs. She extended a hand to Leonie. The wall bore most of the weight as Leonie pushed herself up, but she took the small hand anyway.

"Wanna go eat?" said Annette.

"Ugh, yeah," said Leonie, suddenly realizing that a solid meal would almost definitely improve her mood.

They walked together west, squinting and painted in the evening light, so that no one could guess at first glance that their eyes were still puffy and red.

**Author's Note:**

> The "he" at the beginning is entirely unimportant but I'm imagining Felix or Sylvain since they share supports.  
> Also, I just checked the game, and the specific wall I was imagining kind of doesn't exist, but there's inconsistent architecture tucked all over the place so the spirit of it counts.


End file.
